U.S. Refuses to Hand Over Fighter Source Code to UK 558
orbitalia writes "The UK is heavily involved in the JSF (Joint Strike Fighter program) but has recently considered abandoning the project because the US refuses to share the source code. The UK had intended to purchase $120 billion dollars worth of aircraft to operate on two new aircraft carriers, but is now seriously considering Plan 'B'. This is likely to be further investments in the Eurofighter Typhoon project." From the article: "It appeared that Tony Blair and George Bush had solved the impasse in May, when they announced an agreement in principle that the UK would be given access to the classified details on conditions of strict secrecy. The news was widely seen as evidence that the Prime Minister's close alliance with the American President did have benefits for Britain ... 'If the UK does not obtain the assurances it needs from the US then it should not sign the Memorandum of Understanding covering production, sustainment and follow-on development,' the MPs insisted."
12 Billion, not 120 (Score:1, Informative)
The UK is not unique (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Meh the EF is better anyway (Score:2, Informative)
Your F-22 point is moot. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Why invest in these airplanes at all? (Score:4, Informative)
The UK doesn't have any F-117's and never will. Anyway, the JSF family of planes are intended to replace a number of others:
F-35A: F-16, A-10
F-25B (STOVL): Harrier, F-18
F-35C: F-18
By using a set of three planes that are mostly the same instead of half a dozen completely different ones it should in theory lower costs in terms of a better economy of scale on the planes and their parts and a lower cost of training for pilots, mechanics, etc.
What? (Score:5, Informative)
1) The F-117 has no air-to-air capability. It also has a rather small payload (basically 2 bombs), high maintenance costs due to early technology and is (generally believed, though I think it is still classified) to be a subsnoic jet, in other words, slower. Stealth isn't everything. Also, as it only fills the one role, it is less economical than an all-in-one type aircraft.
2) Uh... since when did anything other than a super-precision ground strike become unpopular politically? The U.S. has certainly used "dumb" bombs in many campaigns, including Afghanistan and Iraq, to good effect under certain conditions and on certain targets. JDAMs - much more economical than laser guided munitions - are also quote popular and while they aren't as accurate, "close" is often good enough, assuming they're fired under certain conditions, of course. Furthermore, this particular aircraft is capable of using laser-guided weapons.
3) You know, there are areas without civilian populations present where Close Air Support could still be a concern... like, say, the mountains of Afghanistan perhaps? Or in the middle of nowhere in the Iraqi desert? Or hundreds of other battlefields? Not every battle in the future will occur in third world cities, you know.
4) A helicopter with a "chain gun" has a limited operational range and exposes itself to a great deal of enemy fire. Helicopters' armament tends to be lighter than what an aircraft can provide, focusing more on armor-piercing weapons (Hellfire missiles), and smaller weapons more useful against vehicles and lighter targets (rockets, canon, etc.). A strike fighter, on the other hand, can deliver 2000 lb. bombs on a target when necessary, enablig it to knock out, say, a heavily reinforced building or bunker than a helicopter would stand no chance against.
I mean, if you don't like this plane, that's cool and all, but there is still a mission out there for it.
Re:Your F-22 point is moot. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Let them squabble (Score:3, Informative)
Only because of restraint. That really isn't relevant to modern fighter planes. No one is shooting f16s with ak47s. Get real.
Re:Let them squabble (Score:4, Informative)
You're comparing light weapons to aircraft? Rather have that, you say? How about you shoot at me and miss because your weapon, while reliable, doesn't have the accuracy to hit me from any farther than maybe 300m, 50m if you shoot like an average Iraqi. (It's reliable because of the tolerances built into the bolt mechanism but that makes it far less accurate. Marines have to qualify at 500m.)
Have fun with that while I'm calling in air support and deciding whether I want to just kill you or to drop the entire building you're in.
This [military.com] will give you the idea.
~ some jarhead
Oh, and I'm pretty sure the Seals "submerge" themselves every once in a while. Marines? Well, we never get near water, right?
Re:Let them squabble (Score:2, Informative)
Or maybe, just maybe, local insurgents killing soldiers on the ground in a country they're occupying has no relevance whatsoever to this topic. Maybe aircraft aren't meant to kill every enemy of the US in one foul blow. The ability to destroy any building, vehicle, or person whose location is known might just be enough to make aicraft like the F-35 worth investing in. You know, assuming someone with an AK-47 hasn't got there first and destroyed it with those new Bunker-Buster-Bullets I'm sure the Russians are about to release...
I for one welcome our new assault rifle wielding overlords.
Re:Why invest in these airplanes at all? (Score:3, Informative)
The F-117 is being retired [hillnews.com] as of 2008 (instead of 2011).
The F-22 replaces some of the F-15's (air superiority role). The F-22 can also perform some ground attack roles with the inception of the 250lb Small Diameter Bomb(SDB) [defense-update.com].
The F-35 replaces some of the F-16/Harrier ground attack missions. The USAF/Reserve/Air Guard will still have a bunch of F-15 and F-16 to go along with the F-22's, and the Navy/Marines will still have a bunch of Harriers to go along with the F-35's.
Re:Deadly serious (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Let them squabble (Score:1, Informative)
They both have phased array radar which just doesn't care about 'stealth' technologies.
Re:Why invest in these airplanes at all? (Score:2, Informative)
All the below information from GlobalSecurity.org.
The F-22 represents a significant design evolution beyond the highly successful F-117A Nighthawk stealth fighter, with performance not achievable by today's front-line fighters. Low observable, or stealth, technology has advanced to the point where conventional aerodynamic configurations can be made incorporating low observability without compromising aerodynamic performance or increasing costs significantly. Design development risk was greatly reduced by the performance demonstrated in the dem/val program where angle of attack attitudes up to 60 degrees were flown. The validity of the low observability features of the F-22's design were confirmed by full-scale pole model testing. Why continue with the JSF?
The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter will be:
Four times more effective than legacy fighters in air-to-air engagements
Eight times more effective than legacy fighters in prosecuting missions against fixed and mobile targets
Three times more effective than legacy fighters in non-traditional Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance (ISR) and Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses and Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses (SEAD/DEAD) missions
About the same in procurement cost as legacy fighters, but requires significantly less tanker/transport and less infrastructure with a smaller basing footprint
Not just source code (Score:5, Informative)
This is not just about source code. In a system like that software, hardware and system integration are inseparable. You either give no information or have to give it all. These are the crown jewels of the platform. Revealing them also reveals any number of critical points for interested adversaries: thrust and manoeuvrability limits, reaction times, counter-measure schemes and logic, EMC-characteristics etc. all of which can be used to find weaknesses and design weapon systems to be more effective against it.
Also, since the UK is only conributing 10% of the development costs, its no wonder the US isnt keen sharing. Usually with mil-tech you only give a bad, incomplete user manual to the client so he can barely operate the thing and then wait for him to pay more for extra features that are already implemented by disabled in software or simply undocumented. You never ever allow the client to have exact specs, schematics or software which would allow him to reverse-engineer and develop his own extentions and applications to it.
Here in Finland we bought old C-model F18 Hornets. When the first upgrade cycle came, the US told us of these new fancy secure ground-to-air datalinks and avionics for combat close formation flying they wanted to sell us. We just told them we had developed our own by then, thankyouverymuch. But that was because the platform was getting old and most of the stuff in there was already open knowledge with multiple nations having purchased them years ago. Also with old-gen mil-aircraft there are a lot of avionics standards which were developed and adhered to during the cold-war to easy manufacturing, lower cost and allow inter-service operations. These JSFs will probably have special new-gen custom avionics to do with flight and weapon control, targeting, radar, stealth, communications and electronic warfare that the US definately wants to keep wrappers on.
Re:Source Not Theirs To Give (Score:3, Informative)
Mod -999 Wrong (Score:5, Informative)
EOR (End-of-rant)
Re:Embarassment (Score:5, Informative)
Falklands (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Why invest in these airplanes at all? (Score:1, Informative)
The F-117 *has* *been* retired, as quietly as it entered service.
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123030185
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?p agename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid =1162421411280&call_pageid=968332188854&col=968350 06
Re:from the should-have-read-the-EULA-first dept? (Score:5, Informative)
Agreed. This is, in fact, the whole premise of NATO. By unifying military command structures and forces, the security of every NATO member is linked to one another, and especially linked to the United States. It's already been that way for 50 years (except for France which withdrew under de Gaulle in the 60's).
One should note that a lot of /.ers are simply making this out to be a U.S. vs. UK thing, but it's more complicated than that. President Bush is fully in favor of giving the UK what it needs in order to certify and fully control the aircraft it purchases. It's principally Rep. Henry Hyde (R-IL) who has been blocking the source code transfer because of his concerns about "technology transfer." Essentially, this is not a Bush administration problem, but a Congressional problem. Since Hyde is retiring, a will be replaced on January 3rd, at least one roadblock may be cleared up.
Code (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Let them squabble (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Mod -999 Wrong (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sorry but I have to keep correcting your ignorance. You cannot install passive radar systems in fighter aircraft. Passive radar systems are huge and heavy and most are composed of multiple geographicly spaced platforms. Again your use of the term phased array is naive. A phased array is merely a trivial way of feeding antenna elements - there are millions of types of antennas which are phased arrays. The idea of phased array has nothing whatsoever to do with countering stealth per-se.
Nor has anyone claimed, righly so, that stealth makes aircraft undetectable. They merely reduce the radar cross section to a certain extent - and such reduction is indeed variable upon frequency as you pointed out. However VHF-radars, which have been used to detect stealth aircraft are slow, innaccurate and highpower (indeed because of the long wavelenght) and thus vulnerable to anti-radiation missiles and other countermeasures. They are ancient technology. The incident in the Balkan war was an exception that proves the rule. The enemy was incapable of threathing the air-supremacy of NATO and its operations, for all aircraft with or without stealth, because of the wide use of electronic warfare and planning of air-corridors. Stealth merely allows one to use such air-corridores more effectively.
As for Soyuz, nobody is suggesting that we should abandon the wheel because JSF is going to replace all our technology. We are going to see aircraft such as F16s, F18s, B52s flying well into the next decade and beyong because they are useful and econmical platforms. The JSF offers new capabilities, in addition to all the tech we have now and will only be produced in quantity that is required to meet these new special missions.
Sorry I have not the time to wade through such rubbish. I only do this stuff for a living. I suggest you get some more reliable sources - start with JANE's literature on the subject.Re:from the should-have-read-the-EULA-first dept? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Let them squabble (Score:5, Informative)
In the first gulf war we did not plan to occupy iraq so we flew something like 300 sorties a day dropping an ungodly amount of bombs on the place. We targeted and destroyed all kinds of crucial civilian infrastructure such as bridges, electrical generation facilites, water treatment plants, roads, factories etc. Our goal was to make the iraqis suffer so much that they would rise up and overthrow saddam so we worked very hard at hurting as many common iraqis as possible. As a result of these efforts and the sanctions that followed we killed close to two million iraqis including hundreds of thousands of children.
That was using the right tool for the right job.
In the second war we wanted to occupy iraq so we didn't want to destroy any infrastructure that we wanted to use ourselves so we didn't target water treatment facilities, bridges etc. We wanted to keep saddams palaces so we could move into them and set up shop. Wrong tool for the wrong job. The US military is awesome at killing, destroying, and making millions of people as miserable as possible. It sucks at police work and occupying an angry populace.
Wrong tool, wrong job.
Terminology (offtopic) (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Can't they just reformat the planes? (Score:3, Informative)
I know you are probably joking, but the UK would build its own nuclear warheads - the ones we operate currently are fully built and maintained in the UK, its the missile bodies that are shared with the US for ease of maintenance.
Re:Falklands (Score:3, Informative)
More interesting, IMO, and relevant to this topic as a whole, is further down the page; concerning the French involvement :
"
In 2005, a book written by President Mitterrand's psychoanalyst, Ali Magoudi, gave a different account of French co-operation, quoting him as saying: "I had a difference to settle with the Iron Lady. That Thatcher, what an impossible woman! With her four nuclear submarines in the South Atlantic, she's threatening to unleash an atomic weapon against Argentina if I don't provide her with the secret codes that will make the missiles we sold the Argentinians deaf and blind.
"
I guess the UK feels it prefers not to be in a similar position that the Argentines were at the time.
Re:Why go to war at all? (Score:2, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_
For starters, I suggest you read sections "Early national period", "Continental expansion", "Indian Wars", "Banana Wars", "The Boxer Rebellion", "Russian Revolution", and "Panama".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_war [wikipedia.org]
Then, for kicks, check out the "Cold War" section above.
Granted, this history is the sum of many imperfect people's actions. That said, believing the US only fights for noble causes is naive. The US has done some ugly things and allied itself with some ugly people in the past to further the agenda of those in the White House (be it good or bad).
Will they be satisfied with the restoration of the Islamic caliphate, the oppression of their women, and the brutal imposition of Sharia law...
There's a big difference between the present Middle East without US troops and a Middle East with a united Islamic empire. You're conveniently skipping several revolutions and not factoring other powers such as Israel into the equation.
Yes, theocracies are notoriously oppressive and intolerant. That said, what does that have to do with the "War on Terrorism"?
If we pulled out the Middle East now and allowed the cancer to grow unchecked then nothing would prevent that final terrible war...
Cancer? Final terrible war? Your post is littered with emotionally charged wording. It is full of black hats and white hats.
The reason for our struggle is
We're struggling to battle? You're not making much sense at this point. Did you mean Christianity vs. Islam, round n?
Re:Embarassment (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Let them squabble (Score:3, Informative)
So they're not people, they're 'insurgents'. In WW2 they weren't people they were 'nazis'.
On the other side I'm sure they call the US troops infidels or invaders or something - same principle.
Meanwhile if one of the US troops gets killed we get news reports about 'Joe from Ohio, and here's film of his greiving family'.
I'm sure the other side do the 'Joe from Baghdad' story as well.
The crazy thing is we've been falling for it ever since mass media was invented...
Re:All out rejection (Score:3, Informative)
The point of the Suez, in "speicial relationship" terms was that the US was not going to forgo it's interests for that of the UK and France, even though the wiki article says (without support) that Eisenhower regretted his postition later. In contrast, and interestingly the only nation to come out "clean" from Suez crisis, the Israeli relationship with the US *is* a speicial relationship. It can be argued that Israel has convinced the US to act against it's own interests and for Israel. The US supply of military technology goes unchecked. This is the mark of a true relationship.
As for Da Bomb, in 1946, the British were denied access to US atomic secrets, even though we had helped develop the bomb. The subsequent treaties of cooperation have more than a little element of US control. For example, the UK *leases* the Trident delivery vehicles from the US Navy, and the war-heads are made from US designs. I wonder how the EULA on those missles reads?
Re:Can't they just reformat the planes? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:no surprise here (Score:4, Informative)
Why do you think the French built the "force de frappe"?
Re:Can't they just reformat the planes? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Meh the EF is better anyway (Score:2, Informative)